Départ de Jérusalem en chemin de fer

Départ de Jérusalem en chemin de fer (1897)

Mixing travel with a train, something that would have been quite popular to people willing to pay and watch this film back in the day. The camera is set on board a train and we see the footage of the station as the train is pulling away. That's pretty much the only thing that happens here but the Lummiere Brothers were making all sorts of movies where their crews traveled the world to shoot footage. Trains were also quite popular in the day so the company decided to combine the two. There's some pretty good footage here that's at least well-shot as we get to see what people were doing at the station. As I always say, it's fascinating getting to see these moments in time that were captured.

I watched this film on a DVD that was rammed with short films from the period. I didn't watch all of them as the main problem with these type of things that their value is more in their historical novelty value rather than entertainment. So to watch them you do need to be put in the correct context so that you can keep this in mind and not watch it with modern eyes. With the Primitives & Pioneers DVD collection though you get nothing to help you out, literally the films are played one after the other (the main menu option is "play all") for several hours. With this it is hard to understand their relevance and as an educational tool it falls down as it leaves the viewer to fend for themselves, which I'm sure is fine for some viewers but certainly not the majority. What it means is that the DVD saves you searching the web for the films individually by putting them all in one place – but that's about it.

With the usual descriptive title I had assumed this would be footage of a train leaving a station in the way that most of the Lumière films I had seen on this collection so far had been about a static shot of an action occurring. So it did actually make me go "oh" to see that the camera this time was on the item that was doing the action and pointing away from it rather than towards it. To the modern eye of course all we're looking at is a train leaving a station – and not even a particularly visually interesting station at that neither. However watched in context of the historical development of the media it is interesting to see the camera taking a person's view – right down to the people waving at "it" as it leaves.

Unlikely to blow your mind or anything like that, but this film is interesting for seeing the development of ideas and techniques by Lumière.

This has some of the most fascinating and beautiful footage of any of the very earliest movies. The resourceful camera idea works out very well, and the setting could hardly have been more interesting. The blend of images and ideas in this short feature has rarely been matched in such a short running time. It's well worth watching a number of times, in order to appreciate all of the details.

Even aside from the subject being filmed, the film is quite resourceful in producing a reversed form of the "phantom rides" that were one of the staples of the very earliest years of motion pictures. The effect is convincing, making the viewers feel very much as if they were on board the train as it pulls away. Moreover, the camera field is set up perfectly, so as to catch plenty of action in the foreground and plenty of detail in the background. Cinematography doesn't get a lot better, in any era.

Even this display of skill might be eclipsed by the material itself. It's fascinating to see this view of Jerusalem, its inhabitants, and its scenery, and it's very fortunate that this footage preserves something of the Jerusalem of its era. The simple view of people from so many different cultures and of so many different personalities, all in one place, creates an atmosphere much quicker than words could have done. Then there is the background view of some of the ruins of old Jerusalem, plus a view of some newer structures. It all speaks eloquently of the history and humanity that is part of the city.

"Leaving Jerusalem By Railway" is one of the very best of the pioneering films from the mid-1890s. The combination of technical skill and imagination plus the fascinating material make it one of the movies of its time most worth watching and remembering.

With the success of the Cinematograph exhibitions in Paris during December 1895 and extending into 1896, the Lumieres made decisions on how to handle the future of the device. Jules Carpentier, the Paris-based engineer who had made 25 of the machines for Louis Lumiere during 1895, was now commissioned to manufacture two-hundred more. No machine would be sold. The Lumieres would train cameramen/projectionists at their Lyon, France headquarters and send them around the world to capture views (soon to be called "actualities") that would be sent back to France for processing and then distributed for exhibition. Exhibitors were franchised by the Lumiere company but were required to use Lumiere employees, who were Lumiere-trained projectionists, for all their presentations.

It was under the above arrangement, that a Lumiere cameraman arrived in Jerusalem during 1896. One film that he made had to have a profound effect on the audience of that day. People who had never been more than a few miles from home could be in Jerusalem and for one minute, actually see their departure from that holy city in that holy land.

We are standing on the observation platform, on the rear car of a train, for our last look at Jerusalem which is seen only through our eyes. Men are standing on the tracks looking at us. In the background are what appears to be stone ruins in an arid area. Abruptly, the train moves away from this scene and the view widens as the men appear to wave good-bye. As massive stone walls come into view, we realize there is a train station platform. We glide past the crowd in front of the station; there to bid us farewell. Christians, Jews or Muslims can relate to the people on the platform; seemingly wistful at our departure. There is a visceral appeal of being in a wonderful place and leaving it with sadness. Forty-four seconds after the start, the screen goes blank.

This type of picture, where the viewer is propelled through a scene by an unseen force, would be used (during the next few years) by a large number of cinematographers and would be called a "phantom ride."

If you take a good look into the world of the first films ever than you will find many different genres that were popular during the time and were copied a lot. "Leaving Jerusalem by Railway" is a film that can be placed in the actuality genre, but can also be considered an entry into the Phantom Ride genre. Phantom Rides were films taken on a train that basically documented the surrounding area as the train moved. And, considering I've seen several of these, I think I can safely call this short the first Phantom Ride film ever. Other phantom ride films include Georges Melies's "Panorama from top of a moving train" and Lumieres' own "Panorama de l'arrivee en gare de Perrache pris d'un train". Films involving phantom rides as part of narrative structures include Smith's "A Kiss in the Tunnel" and Edwin S. Porter's "The Great Train Robbery".

Here, instead of filming in a forward direction like later Phantom Rides, this short moves backwards. The train which the camera is mounted on pulls out of the station and leaves the people behind. I suppose the Lumiere cameraman Alexander Promio only had so much film in the camera so that's why is ended so quickly. Interesting actuality and while not the first moving shot ever (the first moving shot was in "Panorama du Grand Canal pris d'un bateau", another Lumiere short) it does add to that category. It's also an interesting look into the past, as is all of Lumiere's movies.